Following Barry's lead with the soon-to-be-released 2.4.31 kernel, I have compiled the modules from the same MPPE-MPPC patch he used from http://mppe-mppc.alphacron.de/
And I have also compiled PPP 2.4.3 with the compatible patch.
This still may not suit Foxti's needs, but will be good for those people wanting to use PPTPclient right now in a manner consistent with the forthcoming release.

PPTPclient should now work (?)
I'm a VPN novice myself, but I see there's a HOWTO here http://www.linuxquestions.org/linux/answers/Networking/PPTP_VPN_on_Slackware_How_to
the PPTPclient section is half way down.

so ppp-compress-21 is "off", so the bsd_comp module isn't used.
But, perhaps for MPPE this will be needed?
(then I'll have to recompile the kernel yet again, mumble, mumble)

It shouldn't be.

No time to post more now, but if you are debugging PPP (as opposed to PPTP) connections, James Carlson's little book "PPP Design and Debugging" has all the info you are ever likely to need, though it may be a little old (mine is date 1998) and so lacks MPPE specifics.

For PPTP issues, http://pptpclient.sourceforge.net/howto-diagnosis.phtml has all manner of suggestions.

Barry,
Some kernel patches, like this one, just add their extra features to the kernel configuration list. These features then need to be enabled in the configuration.

In "Network device support" the new feature is easy to see - "Microsoft PPP compression/encryption (MPPC/MPPE)". The option was available to enable this either built-in, or as a module. If the module option was not available, of course, I would have had to build a new kernel to get this feature. But as it was, I was able to simply compile a module.
It sounds like you might need to go back and look at your .config!

Regarding the other configuration options - BSD-Compress, SHA1 and ARC4, I only learned that these were necessary from the VPN HOWTO I mentioned before - http://www.linuxquestions.org/linux/answers/Networking/PPTP_VPN_on_Slackware_How_to

Regarding /etc/modules.conf, yes, I think those lines should be uncommented. Otherwise, these modules will need to be manually loaded (as I suggested in my instructions above for Puppy 1.0..

And, of course, practice often mocks theory, so it would be good if someone with VPN access could try my modules with PPTPclient. This might help you to get MPPE working in Puppy2 first time.

From all that I have been able to find so far the BSD_Compress is not needed only yhe ppp_compress_18 When I tested it in vector linux with my Microsoft Servers it worked fione I will try to do it in Puppy today and see if it works using ght patch that has been advised. if any one would like to test the pptp conection please contact me privatly and I will give you info on how to test using my servers as I have already set up a privates test account fowever I do not want to give this information out to the world for obvious reasons.

Foxti, success.
I just connected to your VPN test account, and I did it from dial-up internet access, which I thought might fail because there would be 2 instances of pppd. I followed the HOWTO mentioned earlier, but I will list my own HOWTO here, because I found their instructions about the chap-secrets file confusing.

edit: my remastered version of Puppy has no firewall. You might consider disabling Puppy's firewall before testing.

Let's assume a PPTP server address of 123.456.769.01, username: fredflintstone, password: fredspassword, and refer to our connection as Myvpnaccount1.
Load the modules I mentioned before ... although later you can try without doing this ... it might not be necessary -
modprobe ppp_generic
modprobe ppp_mppe_mppc
#modprobe bsd_comp ## I don't think this one is necessary
modprobe sha1
modprobe ppp_async
modprobe ppp_deflate
modprobe ppp_synctty

Create /etc/ppp/options.pptp and add this -
lock noauth nodeflate nobsdcomp
(actually, I entered each of these on a separate line, as most other files here seem to have this format)

To /etc/ppp/chap-secrets (which should be empty) add this -
fredflintstone pptpd fredspassword *
(don't forget the asterisk on the end)
Some PPTP servers require a domain name, in which case the line would be -
mydomain\\fredflintstone pptpd fredspassword *

Foxti didn't give me any details of the network on the other side of the VPN server, so I just used this line -
/sbin/route add -host 123.456.789.01 dev ppp

Now you should be able to start the tunnel -
pppd call Myvpnaccount1

Open /var/log/messages and you should see a successful pppd daemon listing local IP address and remote IP address.
I could ping the remote IP address (inside the tunnel), thus confirming a successful VPN connection ... but I had no opportunity to attempt any form of file transfer, so I don't assume full success yet.Last edited by tempestuous on Wed 15 Mar 2006, 09:57; edited 1 time in total

Guys, I'm following this thread, but fairly "lightly".
So, anything that you discover that needs to be fixed or changed for the next
puppy, spell it out to me. Like, for example, changes to modules.conf.

Foxti, regarding your p.m. reporting some other issues with puppy2, yes,
it's only a snapshot, just for you to test MPPE/VPN, and there are many outstanding issues I'm working on.

Yes, well spotted Barry. I'm still not sure whether any of the lines that are presently commented out in /etc/modules.conf need to be un-commented, but what's absolutely necessary is the new line -
alias ppp-compress-18 ppp_mppe_mppc

It would probably be a good thing to have this line included in Puppy2 ... and perhaps also /etc/ppp/options.pptp since this contains only generic setup information.

All of the other configuration files I mentioned contain text unique to each user. And the inclusion of /etc/ppp/ip-up might actually cause problems for normal (non VPN) dial-up situations.

"alias char-major-108 ppp_generic" appears to be commented out, but then I see that it is duplicated on a separate line.

With my modules.conf/modules.conf0 set up like this and all other PPTP configuration files ready, it was not necessary to manually load any modules. All I had to do was run "pppd call Myvpnaccount1" and /var/log/messages reported success.

I then ran "lsmod" and I could see that all modules just mentioned were loaded ... except ppp_async ... but who knows, maybe this module is loaded once a process like a file transfer is initiated.
Also, the cryptographic modules were now loaded, sha1 and arc4.

I have compiled it into a puppy disk using the .createpuppy and it woks great so far It also works wonderfully in Puppy 2 I have left thins as is for other pptp connections as well and it works perfect

The reason that the line
#require-mppe-128 ## I got an error message from this, so deleted it.

did not work was not because it is wrong however the version of pptp and ppp that we are using only need "require" not the full line I also learned that is you put in and of the exclude commands then it will not work with other VPN PPTP connections that do not need them. and if you put in "require" it will not work on non MPPE connections as it can not get past that point. so if you leave it as it is now It works with all the servers I have tryed it on MPPE, MPPC, Cisco, and Linux VPN servers. that is all I had available to test on so I am not sure past that.

Now I just have to work out a couple other small issues I am having with the ./createpuppy script that I am having. where in some of the applications do not work even from a clean build without the MPPE stuff in them. I am using a clean puppy-unleashed each time I try to create them also and even foilloing the defaults I get the same issues.

Thanks again for all your help this has been a great learning experience even for a newbe like myself.

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot vote in polls in this forumYou cannot attach files in this forumYou can download files in this forum